"The National Security State" (1988) Summary and Analysis

Vidal offers five proposals to end the "National Security State" that began when the United States decided (with virtually no public awareness) to go on a permanent wartime economy and confront the "Red Menace" that was used as a bogeyman by President Truman after World War II. The tenets of this state were defined in the National Security Act of 1947: never negotiate with the Russians, develop the hydrogen bomb, rapidly build up conventional forces, enact a large tax increase to finance the garrison, mobilize the entire American society to fight communism, set up a strong alliance system directed by the United States (NATO), and make the people of Russia our allies.

Vidal dates the coup d'etat that brought about the national security state as January 1950, when Americans sacrificed control of their economy and...